


I Have None To Show To The One I Love (But, Deny, Deny, Denial)

by strawberrykiwicaprisun



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Angst, Fluff, Internalized Homophobia, Mentions of Smut, Multi, References to Previous Self Harm, josh and tyler are boyfriends but also have their wives but this is a joshler fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-29
Updated: 2019-10-29
Packaged: 2021-01-06 07:23:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 17,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21222782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strawberrykiwicaprisun/pseuds/strawberrykiwicaprisun
Summary: Watching Josh and Debby plan their wedding has made him come to a very important realization.Tyler wants a wedding.What he doesn’t realize is that he has been a less than stellar partner and might just lose Josh in the process of making it up to him.





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You ever start writing a fic and halfway through you realize it’s basically a vent fic that’s helping you just work out some of your own problems? Yeah. That’s what happened here. This was supposed to be roughly 5k and it turned out closer to 17k so.

Tyler gets an itch in his heart when Josh asks Debby to marry him. He thinks nothing of it really, he kisses Josh the minute he and Debby get back home from New Zealand and the itch goes away.

The itch returns when Josh and Debby start planning their wedding, of course asking Jenna and Tyler for their opinions on all sorts of things as they go, because a) they’ve been through the wedding planning before and b) because Jenna and Tyler are important to Josh and Debby as their respective best friends and their opinion matters.

Tyler scratches the itch by giving his opinions and in return getting a smile from Josh and warm fuzzy feeling in his chest when Josh chooses the option Tyler likes best.

Jenna, the ever careful and knowing person she is, tuned into Tyler’s emotions completely, recognizes the sudden hay fever in Tyler’s heart and prods him gently to talk about it one afternoon at a cake tasting for the soon to be couple. 

Josh and Debby had invited them and a few family members to get “a control group” as Debby had put it, to see which cake people liked the most, instead of just choosing the cake they liked the best themselves. That was just the kind of couple they were, more happy with making everyone happy than just choosing for themselves.

“What’s got your nose in sniffles?” Jenna sits next to Tyler at a white cotton cloth covered table, and dips her finger into a spot of icing on her plate.

“Hm?” Tyler clears his throat and realizes he had been zoned out staring at the next slice of cake he had been handed to try.

“You’ve got that same look you had at our own cake tasting.” Jenna smiles fondly at him and sticks an icing covered finger into her mouth. “Mm. I like the lemon but I’m not sure it’d make a good wedding cake.” She says, checking off ‘no’ on the makeshift scorecard she made on a frilly napkin.

Tyler nods in agreement even though he hasn’t tried it yet.

“All this wedding planning has me thinking about our wedding, that’s why. I’m reminiscing.” He hums and leans over to capture her lips in a sticky, lemony kiss.

“Hopefully Josh will do better than Tyler did at the reception.” Debby flutters over and sits down next to Jenna to look over Jenna’s list. 

Debby looks up at Tyler teasingly.

“If I recall correctly Tyler fed himself the cake instead of you right?” Josh sits down next to Tyler and pats his thigh in amends to the teasing.

“At least I had better taste in cake flavors.” Tyler says jokingly and shoves a too large piece of iced lemon cake in his mouth.

“It seems like buttercream is everyone’s favorite but that’s to be expected. Plain yellow cake comes in second.” Debby tallies up the list.

“You should get the red velvet. It may not be everyone’s favorite but I know it’s yours.” Tyler whispers to Josh over Jenna and Debby’s chatter.

“I’m gonna have like one bite, the rest goes to everybody else how’s that fair?” Josh asks him, turning to face him in his chair.

“It’s your wedding day. You get to be selfish, screw what Aunt Patricia says about traditional wedding flavors.” Tyler nudges Josh’s elbow with his own. They both know Josh is too selfless to pick the red velvet and he’ll end up choosing the buttercream.

He catches Jenna staring at them with her ever present knowing look but for once Tyler is out of the loop. He doesn’t understand what she’s calculating behind her eyes.

Tyler’s hay fever in his heart breaks out into a rash over his mind as well, two weeks later when he’s helping Josh pick out which boutonnière flower he should wear for the big day.

Theoretically he knows the flower in Josh’s lapel is supposed to match the flowers that line the aisle but Josh and Debby are anything but traditional and coordinated. They make design choices based on what makes them happiest, not what’s going to look the best. Tyler admires that about them.

“I can’t decide between the poppy’s, the orchids, or the hydrangeas.” Josh holds up the three tiny floral displays wrapped in white ribbon and gives them a menacing stare, trying to intimidate the choice out of the flowers.

“I had an orchid one for my wedding.” Tyler comments and Josh nods and sets that arrangement down gently on the table.

Tyler had never really dreamed about what his wedding would be like until he had to start planning his own. He figured he mostly leave it up to whom ever he married, but was surprised when he found himself getting so involved and excited about every choice and aspect of his wedding, down to the color of the napkins. Jenna told him it was because he liked control, but he thinks maybe the act of picking out something together, just made him feel good.

Despite him and Josh being boyfriends for 6 years, he thought he should know everything about Josh by now, he was also surprised at how involved Josh was with his wedding plans.

Really he shouldn’t have been surprised. Josh has always been the hopeless romantic type. It was heartwarming to see him get so caught up in choosing a flower arrangement, Tyler wonders if this is how Josh felt about him when he was planning his wedding with Jenna.

“The poppy’s match the color scheme.” Josh says looking down at the poppy flowers forlornly.

“I like the hydrangeas better on you.” Tyler holds up the two flowers to Josh’s chest and squints to compare. The blue of the hydrangeas matches the color of Josh’s hair when they fell in love.

Tyler thinks how comfortable he is helping Josh with his wedding. About how warm it makes him. He’s not sure why, but helping plan the event makes him feel like he’s impossibly more in love with the man.

Josh ends up picking a different arrangement entirely. A brilliant Dahlia.

Tyler’s itch turns into full blown poison ivy.

Jenna definitely knows something is up with him but neither of them know what it is. Except she might. But she’s not telling him outright.

They’re sitting together on their couch in their home in Ohio, miles away from where Debby and Josh’s wedding will take place in just over a week in Los Angeles, watching the TLC channel.

Jenna mutes the television when a commercial comes on and she throws her legs into his lap to face him and Tyler knows a conversation is coming.

“Debby’s wedding dress came in. It looks beautiful, Josh is gonna love it.” She says nonchalantly. 

“You helped her pick it out I’m sure it’s perfect.” Tyler smiles warily at her. He knows she’s getting to something.

“The two of us helping them out with their wedding plans has been nostalgic hasn’t it?” 

Tyler eyes her and nods slowly. 

“It’s been fun to watch you be nit picky over details with him.” She comments airily, running her hands through the hair on the back of his head and scratching lightly.

He waits for her to continue, unsure of what’s going on.

“It’s interesting to watch a wedding day get created right in front of you, when you get to watch it up close from an outside perspective.” 

Tyler places his hands on her legs and draws little patterns with his finger. The show has come back on but he doesn’t dare hit the unmute button.

“Are you trying to tell me you want to renew our vows?” Tyler smirks and scratches as his face, stubble growing through and making it rough to the touch.

“No, Tyler. This just all has me thinking, watching you interact with Josh about the wedding, what your wedding would be like if you had one.” She says simply.

Tyler furrows his brow and blinks a little, hands coming to a stop as he thinks.

“Between me and Josh?” 

Jenna nods and smiles.

“It’d probably be a disaster. Besides we’ve never needed some guy in a robe to tell us we are married. We practically already are.” Tyler shrugs, and scratches distractedly at the skin over his heart.

“Hm. Alright.” She says all too breezily. She goes to unmute the TV but Tyler grabs it from her and mutes it again.

“What?” He narrows his eyes at her.

“What, what?” She says with a little smile.

He squeezes her sides and she yelps with laughter.

“You’re being vague. You know I’m bad at picking up nuances, what’s going on?”

“Nothings going on!” She holds her hands up and rolls her eyes. “Just seems like you’ve really enjoyed doing this with him. I got curious to know if you’ve ever thought about what a wedding with him would be like.” She shrugs back at him.

Tyler sits back and stares at his feet propped up on the coffee table. No, he hadn’t ever thought about what it would be like to get married to Josh. 

“I guess it just never came up.” He says halfheartedly.

“You never once thought about what it would be like? Of all the places you two have been in the world you’ve never stopped and thought it would be a nice place for a wedding?” 

He sits and ponders for a moment. 

“Maybe... In Iceland. When we were at the top of the cliffs, I thought about what it would be like if we stayed there forever because it was so beautiful, but I don’t think I ever pictured us getting married there or anywhere.” He frowns.

“Okay. That’s alright. It just had me thinking is all.” She settles back into the couch to watch the show, but Tyler doesn’t very much feel like watching 90 day fiancé anymore. 

He supposed it probably was strange that the idea had never occurred to him. He and Josh had been together longer than he and Jenna, but that’s just because their relationship was different right? They’ve never needed a wedding. It’s never been on their radar. 

Helping Josh pick out wedding items was fun though. He could easily imagine them doing it together for their own date. It catches him off guard when the itch in his heart is soothed at the thought of him and Josh getting married. That’s new. But not unwelcome. Incredibly curious and odd and unexpected. But not unwelcome.

Since Jenna’s questioning struck the match in question of a wedding between Tyler and Josh, he absolutely can’t get the idea out of his mind. From then on, the poison ivy in his heart spreads to not only his chest but all over his body, down to his ten fingers and toes. Every question Josh asks his opinion for Tyler’s immediate reaction is to imagine what it would look like for a wedding of their own. 

He’s got it bad. Wedding fever. 

But that’s ridiculous. What would a marriage between him and Josh even look like? Nothing would change really, they live together on the road for months at a time and then live with their girls for the other months. They may not have a house together but they surely already have a home in each other’s hearts. Still. The idea of a ceremony plucks at the strings of Tyler’s heart. Tyler realizes in some ways he’s already written his vows to Josh in the forms of various songs, sung to thousands of people over the years.

The poison ivy gets angrier and angrier from his scratching at it in the form of pining over the thought of getting married to Josh. Scratching has only made it worse.

His skin breaks and bleeds the day Josh and Debby get married. Tyler is standing in the groomsmen line at the alter, looking over the huge amount of people that are attending. It comes with the territory of knowing so many people and being known by so many people, but as Tyler sneaks glances at Josh’s nervous form a few steps down from him, he can’t help but think about how nice it would be if the two of them could have a tiny wedding, with few people in a small setting, intimate and good. And just like that the sores from the poison ivy burst and he realizes, right as Debby is walking down the aisle in her absolutely gorgeous dress, in the immaculately decorated church, in front of 500 people, that he wants to marry Josh. He wants it so bad his heart aches, tears sting behind his eyes and his hands sweat. 

How had he never thought about this before? It would be so good. Make him so happy. He wants to rush out the door and find the nearest jeweler to buy a ring right this second. But he doesn’t. He stuffs it down deep as Josh kisses Debby and the whole room erupts into cheers. This is their day. He won’t ruin his good time by being selfish. He can wait. He’s waited nearly seven years just fine. He can wait until they’re back from their honeymoon and even some time after that.

Tyler lets himself relax and enjoy the day, caught up in the celebration and the love on Josh’s face and the happiness in his heart from Debby being a match made in heaven for him. 

Jenna is dutifully by his side, sensing his minor crisis and helping him unwind. He doesn’t deserve any of them.

“You alright?” She talks through her smile quietly to him as they throw rice over Josh and Debby making their way to their car out of the reception hall to go to their honeymoon.

“Yeah. Just thinking about what you said about us getting married. I get what you mean now.” He says back. 

She doesn’t say anything but he knows she understands when she rubs his back comfortingly, the warmth seeping through his suit.

Josh races up to him to hug him and rest his forehead against Tyler’s before he waves him goodbye and gets into the car to go to Monte Carlo for two weeks.

Tyler doesn’t know why he’s feels upset that he couldn’t say goodbye to Josh properly.


	2. Chapter 2

Tyler manages to wait a long time to pop the question to Josh. He’s quite proud of himself for displaying so much control over his emotions when Josh does little things every day that make him want to scream out “MARRY ME!”

Jenna helps of course, she’s a soothing solution to his marred skin from the horrible itch in his heart. But Tyler fears the only cure is getting Josh down the aisle.

He wants to wait plenty enough time that the new glow of Josh’s marriage wears off so he doesn’t take away from that. The first year is important. Tyler can barely stand waiting a year. It’s always in the back of his mind. He has frequent flare ups of the itching in his head and his heart. But it’s calmer now that he’s come to the giddy realization that he wants Josh as a husband.

It’s the middle of tour, in the middle of Florida, and he’s in the middle of a flare up. He’s using Josh’s laptop one day, and misclicks on one of the bookmarks in the google tab. It brings him up to a pinterest page, a board filled with various pins all relating to wedding planning. Tyler doesn’t think anything of it. Just scratches at the skin over his heart and goes to click on the correct tab when his eyes catch over the last time the wedding board was updated. It was the day before his and Jenna’s wedding.

“Whatcha lookin at?” Debby appears behind him and his puffs up like a cat and nearly jumps to the ceiling.

“I wasn’t snooping I accidentally clicked on his pinterest board for your wedding!” Tyler clutches his heart and she snickers at him, looking over his shoulder at the laptop screen.

Curiously, her face falls not only into a frown but a look of anger aimed at him.

“Oh. That’s an old board, not ours. This is ours.” She clicks to another one that was more recently updated just before their wedding day.

He raises an eyebrow at her as she sets her jaw and looks him right in the eyes.

“Um. Sorry. I wasn’t looking to spy on his pinterest, I just wanted to google the mass of a blue whale.” He says unsurely, nervous at her sudden coldness towards him. He has no idea why she would be upset with him seeing Josh’s pinterest but clicks away abruptly anyway.

She leaves the room and life goes on. She isn’t cold to him again after that. Tyler forgets about it.

He thinks the poison ivy is turning to blisters. Jenna’s soothing isn’t working anymore. Tyler breaks down and loses his composure. He had planned to ask Josh somewhere spectacular, maybe somewhere in Iceland, he and Josh had both loved Iceland. But he can’t help himself when they’re backstage after a festival in states, in a tiny green room by themselves, using up the last of their adrenaline by kissing each other breathless.

He has to get it out before this goes any further and he loses the confidence the adrenaline gives him.

“Marry me.” Tyler says into the kiss.

Josh snorts and continues kissing him.

“Josh please marry me.” Josh disconnects from him to look him in the eyes before rolling them and going back to kissing his neck.

“Josh, I’m not kidding around, I want to marry you so badly I think I’ll die if I don’t I love you so much.”

“Stop.” Josh says into his neck and stops attacking it.

“Please, I know you just had your first wedding anniversary with Debby but I’ve been wanting to marry you for like over a year now and I can’t take it anymore.”

“Tyler, stop.” Josh pulls away completely, taking a step back from Tyler.

“I haven’t even bought a ring yet and I meant to ask you in a much more romantic place than a green room in Chicago but I’m so overwhelmed with how much I love you.”

“Tyler.” Josh has tears in his eyes, but a frown on his face and his nose is scrunched up in anger.

“Will you marry me?” Tyler implores again.

“Tyler. Shut the fuck up.” Josh spits.

Tyler is taken a back by his reaction. His fists are clenched by his side and a single tear escapes his eye.

“Josh, I’m not bullshitting you, I would never pull a prank like this, I’m serious.” 

“You’re serious?” Josh says dangerously low and Tyler is suddenly afraid and has no idea what’s going on.

“Josh-“ Tyler says gently.

“Don’t you dare. I’ve never known you to be this cruel. Don’t touch me.” His voice cracks when Tyler reaches out to him and Tyler has to hold back his own tears at Josh’s biting tone. He’s never spoken to Tyler like that.

Josh takes a deep breath and storms out, flinging the door open and going presumably to his bus, leaving Tyler wondering what just happened. 

Jenna was walking by their dressing room when Josh stormed out and gives a worried look Josh’s way and then to Tyler.

“I don’t know what I did.” Tyler breathes.

Jenna wordlessly follows after Josh for him.

Tyler numbly picks up his stuff and walks to his bus alone. Everyone else rides on Josh’s as they go to the hotel. He’s hurt but he doesn’t even know what to cry about. He’s confused. And he hurts because he’s obviously hurt Josh but he doesn’t know how.

He goes up to his hotel room alone and sits on the couch and stares at the wall for a while, hoping the answer is in the hideous pattern of the floral wallpaper.

He’s hopeful, when he hears his door opening, that it’s Josh coming to talk to him after he’s had some time to calm down, but is surprised when Debby bursts through his door, fire in her eyes.

“Look I probably deserve whatever you’re going to do to me but please believe me when I say I really don’t know what I did so if you could just tell me so I can fix it first, then you can kill me.” He backs away from her form that’s shaking in anger.

“How could you.” She starts.

“He’s in there crying his eyes out with  
Your. Wife. comforting him.” She jabs him in the chest with her finger on the words “your wife” to prove her point.

“I-“

“I know it’s been years but why would you ever think it’s okay to joke about something like that?” She balls her hands into fists and Tyler backs up another step.

“I wasn’t kidding! I really want to marry him!” He exclaims back.

She rolls her eyes. “And you thought it would go perfectly fine after what you did to him? That he’d jump into your arms and you’d carry him over the foyer?” She snaps.

“Debby I have no idea what you’re talking about. What did I do?”

“You’re seriously playing dumb? Or have you just magically forgotten about rejecting Josh’s marriage proposal to you?” 

“What?!” He squeaks. “He’s never-“

“Josh has been wanting to marry you since before you even met Jenna. He told me all about how you turned him down.”

“No he hasn’t.” Tyler denies out of disbelief. “I would never reject him!”

“Maybe not now. You seriously forgot about it?” She looks sick at the sight of him and the feeling is growing mutual as she reveals more to him.

“Tyler he’s had a pinterest board for your wedding since 2013 for christ’s sake! You were looking at it in Florida!” She raises her voice.

“I didn’t know that’s what that was!” He suddenly knows why she was being so cold to him that day.

“Oh my gosh I can’t believe you.” She presses her palms into her eyes and groans. “Do you not know him at all? Of course he’s wanted to marry you for this long I can’t believe it didn’t occur to you!” 

“He never asked me to marry him!” He defends hopelessly. 

Debby digs into her pocket where she was holding Josh’s cellphone and wallet during their set. She pulls out his wallet and digs a folded up piece of paper.

“Here. Maybe this will jog your memory.” She sighs in frustration and slams the door behind her, and he’s left alone with the paper.

He unfolds it carefully, the sides worn from being tucked into his wallet for probably a long time. 

It’s a poem, with the title “For Tyler” at the top in Josh’s perfect scrawl.

“I remember this.” He says aloud to no one and falls back into his seat on the couch.

He folds the paper back up ever so carefully and clenches his jaw as his tears threaten to spill over. He has no right to cry. It’s Josh the one he’s hurt. He’s so angry at himself though and he feels like he’s going to shatter his own teeth from clenching so hard. He’s stares at the stupid wall for what feels like hours as he beats himself up. He knows he should be crawling on his knees over to Josh’s room but he’s glued to his seat with guilt and shame and anger at himself.

He shoots out of his seat and wipes his eyes furiously when Josh enters his hotel room and shuffles in with a dejected look.

Tyler doesn’t speak first. He doesn’t have the right. He wants Josh to be able to say what he needs to. For once Tyler shuts himself up.

“They were going to kill us if one of us didn’t come to talk to the other.” Josh says quietly.

Tyler should’ve been the one coming to him.

“I’m sorry.” Tyler whispers.

“Don’t.” Josh’s lip quivers. Josh doesn’t seem like he has any fight left in him, just worn and tired as he speaks.

“I asked you to marry me four times. You outright laughed at me or never took me seriously each time. Even flat out denied me once.” Josh starts and refuses to meet his eyes.

Tyler swallows the lump in his throat but doesn’t defend himself.

“And the fact that you don’t even remember it hurts worse than you rejecting me back then.” A tear falls from Josh’s eye and Tyler takes a step towards him, too used to being able to comfort him. Josh steps away from his advance even though they’re across the room from each other. 

“I’ll refresh your memory.” Josh says quietly.

“The first time, was after that show in the basement in 2013. I straight up asked you to marry me backstage after the show. And I know you probably thought I was kidding because it was kind of ridiculous, two 24 year olds getting married?” Josh shakes his head. Tyler wants to tell him that it’s not ridiculous at all. But keeps his mouth shut.

“You snorted at me and said ‘Post show adrenaline makes you say stupid stuff sometimes huh?’ and when I told you I was serious you laughed it off and told me to go take a shower and get my head on straight.”

Tyler remembers the moment as Josh recants it for him. He feels the same guilt and shame that glued him to the couch, twist in his gut and crawl its way up his throat.

“So I thought, yeah, we are a little young to be making that kind of decision or commitment to each other. But I loved you so much I swallowed my pride and asked you again at that gas station in the middle of nowhere Oklahoma? It was like 3 in the morning and the gas station had those prize candy machines with the little capsules that come with cheap rings in them so I bought one because it was what I could afford because we were putting every cent we got right back into the tank. Right back into our dream. And you were sleeping in the backseat but I was so excited to ask you right then I had to wake you up and give it to you. Do you remember what I told you?” Josh asks.

Tyler shakes his head just barely, his own tears spilling when he sees how Josh’s face falls when he does it.

“I told you, maybe not right now but one day when we were stable financially and in our own relationship, when we were ready, if you wanted to marry me. I made it very clear that it could be far down along the line until we were both ready. I was so insecure but I craved that reassurance that you wanted me permanently. You never could say yes. You joked about only being worth a 75¢ ring and then just said that the music and the message was the most important thing in your life right now and we could think about it later. And you were right that was more important to focus on.”

Tyler shakes his head furiously at that. “No it wasn’t Josh you were always more important than that.” He finally speaks up.

Josh ignores his outburst.

“The third time, we were playing one of our biggest shows yet in Ohio at that beautiful ballroom with that outdoor reception area and of course because I’m a stupid hopeless romantic I couldn’t help but imagine how perfect a wedding would be there and I told you I wished we could get married there, but if it came to it I’d marry you in Vegas if that’s what it took for us to make it permanent because gay marriage wasn’t even legal yet except for in Nevada and maybe in New York and because I was so desperate for you to understand how important it was to me.” Josh’s hands clench by his sides and Tyler sees how they shake in anger or sadness or just being overwhelmed he doesn’t know but he does know it makes his heart hurt.

“And you turned up your nose, told me you loved me but gave another sarcastic answer saying a walmart would be more spacious than that place and it ‘isn’t your thing’.” Josh puts quotes in the air. 

Tyler feels the guilt and shame in his throat start to choke him and it feels awfully like when he would dream about black hands wrapped around his neck and he swallows harshly.

“The final time, I showed you the beginning of those stupid vows I wrote to you and I didn’t tell you that it was vows because I thought you’d get the picture. You told me it was a good poem and that I should finish it, and I said you could hear the rest if you stood in front of somebody with a bible and said ‘I do’ to me.” Josh eyes the folded piece of paper in Tyler’s fingers and it burns his finger tips, the never fully finished vows feels heavy in his light grip. 

“And you scoffed and said ‘well that’s not gonna happen’ and despite getting flat out told no, I let you fuck me that night because it was your way of telling me I do.

“It’s not.” Tyler chokes out.

“It was.” Josh says.

“Josh, I’m so sorry I never realized-“

“You’ve told me every day since we’ve been together that you love me and that we’ll be together for the rest of our lives and you could never let me go, so I never understood why it was such a far fetched and unappealing idea to you to just say those same words but written down on a piece of paper in front of some officiant.”

“I do want to-“

“After that I gave up ever getting a real answer out of you because I realized if you gave me a joking denial four times then /surely/ you were aware that I was being serious. I just figured that you weren’t the marriage type, and you were to embarrassed or you didn’t want to let me down to tell me outright. And I accepted that! I accepted that I wanted a wedding and you weren’t the type so I let it go! It was okay! I knew we would be together forever anyway so I convinced myself that it really wasn’t a big deal and it was just a stupid fantasy, just to please you. I was happy channeling that fantasy into making a stupid pinterest board about what our wedding would be like.” Josh’s voice gains confidence but he never raises his voice or spits at Tyler. He has too good of a heart.

“But then, then you asked Jenna to marry you. And of course I was over the moon, I was so happy for you both, but I also couldn’t help but think, you /were/ the marriage type after all. It was just me you didn’t want to marry. And then you had the audacity to ask me to come along on your honeymoon-“ Josh’s voice wavers.

“You were both my partners of course I was going to ask you!” Tyler stops himself from reaching out to Josh and pinches himself instead.

“But you didn’t once think about how I might’ve felt? Asking her to marry you but not me? Up until then I had always felt equal to her, but after that I just accepted the fact that I was in second place. I could never harbor any ill will against her, don’t get me confused I love her so much. I thought for sure you knew I wanted a marriage because I had asked you so many times before, and either didn’t care or refused to think about it. I guess you refused to address it so much that you forgot about all of this.”

Tyler chokes and sobs and slaps a hand over his mouth because he knows his tears aren’t justified. Doing this to Josh and him keeping it bottled up for 5 years, just to not rock the boat? Tyler would never forgive himself. He remembers everything Josh says as he says it. He feels somewhere deep down it’s because Josh was right. He didn’t want a marriage then. And he so aggressively denied wanted to get married that he forced the thoughts into a dark and locked away place to never be addressed and remembered for his own selfish reasons.

“You didn’t even tell me goodbye or even see me before you left for your honeymoon.”

Tyler knows why he felt so terrible when Josh waved him goodbye at his own wedding.

“You didn’t know it, but I broke up with you those two weeks of your honeymoon, I couldn’t work up the courage to tell you because I was heartbroken but when you came back, things fell right back the way they were and I had my place right there in your heart just the same. I got over it. I haven’t thought about that board or a wedding between us until I told Debby right before we got married. I haven’t been resentful or angry with you this whole time or anything like that, really I was fine. Because you’re right again. We don’t need a wedding or a marriage to convince or prove to anybody the sincerity of our relationship or that we’ll be together forever. We already know that. It was never about telling the world that we were together, because people are too unforgiving and critical of things they don’t understand and it would’ve made our lives hell. It was never about making it official so that I could feel equal to yours and Jenna’s relationship. Never. After you got back from your honeymoon I bounced right back to feeling equal because I was. I am. You proved it to me time and time again because you’re so good at love. But dammit Tyler I just wanted one.”

“I’m sorry. I know I’ve done something terrible-“

“And you were purposefully ignorant of that. I just figured it was because-“ Josh sighs and shakes his head.

“Because what?” Tyler gnaws on his lip to keep himself from grinding his teeth anxiously.

“I don’t want to hurt you.” Josh says pitifully and his brow furrows as more tears slip out.

Tyler knows it’s because even after all Tyler has put him through he knows josh isn’t a vindictive person.

“Tell me.”

“Because a marriage between you and me wouldn’t have had the support of your family. If we had one today would they be supportive? Maybe. I’m still not sure. And I could never fault you for choosing a relationship with your family over having a wedding with me. But we could’ve had a secret one. Just a few people and yeah it would’ve hurt to not have our families there but it would’ve made me happy, or maybe it would just make us feel bad about our relationship knowing we didn’t have that support. We’ll never know. Because you never even entertained the idea of listening to me when I said it was important to me.”

Tyler isn’t sure his family would support a wedding between him and Josh even now either. Maybe his siblings would. But he knows Josh is right. He knows he had a lot of unaddressed issues with their relationship when it started because of how he was raised and that’s why he had gone to therapy and sorted and figured himself out for the better. Apparently he didn’t figure everything out.

“And please know that I completely and totally understand that a wedding, marriage, all of it isn’t really important. It’s just a dumb ceremony and marriage is outdated. It’s not a huge deal. But I was so unsure of myself then, I thought it was what I wanted more than anything. The idea of being tied to the one you love under the eyes of the law and under the laws of God just felt so right when it was with you, no matter how silly the whole concept is.”

“I know that. It’s not dumb I felt the same way when I was helping you pick out stuff for your wedding, it made me realize that I wanted to marry you so bad it felt like I had thorns in my heart, like it was the only thing keeping me going was asking you to make it permanent. It’s not stupid Josh I feel that way too.”

Josh ignores his statement again. “I thought you were teasing me when you asked me to marry you in the dressing room because you teased me every time I asked you.”

“Josh-“

“No matter how you slice it, whether you didn’t realize how important it was, whether you thought I was kidding, whether you unconsciously rejected the idea of marriage between two men because of your upbringing, you still hurt me. And it never occurred to you in 7 years of being together that you wanted to marry me, until I got a wedding of my own. And that’s selfish. You realize you want to marry me when you see me marrying somebody else but it doesn’t hit you when I blatantly outright ask you to marry me? that’s a lie.”

“You were right, I was scared of the idea of forever with someone back then so I laughed it off because thats all I knew how to do because I was trying to figure myself out and I didn’t know how to fight it properly and I hurt you in the process and I shoved it far away so I would never have to deal with it, but I didn’t realize that’s what I was doing.”

“You should’ve just said ‘no, Josh I’m not ready but maybe someday’ and it would’ve been fine for you to leave it open ended like that! But because you danced around the idea entirely and never gave me a straight answer I always held out hope for nothing and always had that nagging doubt in the back of my mind that we weren’t gonna be forever because if you could marry her than why not me too?  
And I never got closure about that. So when you asked me in the dressing room to marry you the dam broke because moving on without closure makes for a very unstable bridge.”

Josh is so so good and kind and wise.

“And to answer your question, no I won’t marry you. It’s too late. You missed your chance. If we have a wedding now I’m only going to think about what it took to get there and it will feel like we are just doing it to make everything even, and not because we actually want to get married.”

“But I do want to marry you, with my whole heart, I asked you to marry me before I knew- remembered that I had done this to you, I’m not asking you now because I’m just trying to make up for hurting you, it’s because I genuinely want this too!” Tyler is all too aware of how desperate he sounds because he feels like he’s losing Josh. Or maybe he already has.

“Like I said, you only wanted to marry me after you saw me get married to somebody else. Are you sure you want to marry me or are you just asking me because you’re possessive? I know you don’t think that way but just for a minute ask yourself if you’re doing it unconsciously. Just like how you unconsciously rejected me four times. And don’t answer that right now.”

Tyler opens his mouth to speak but Josh never lets the words come out.

“I know you’re sorry. I know you didn’t realize. I don’t fault you for asking you to marry me. I should’ve told you my feelings about this way sooner and maybe we could’ve already been married right now. But it’s out there now. We’re good, I promise. There’s nothing you have to make up to me, you’ve already made it up to me every day by being who you are and being the best partner I could ever dream for. It’s done.” 

Tyler can’t help but hear a bitter twinge in Josh’s voice.

“I don’t know how to fix this Josh. I don’t know how I could’ve ever done this to you. I’m so sorry.”

“There’s nothing to fix Tyler, really. I’m glad you know now and we can just carry on like normal and do our band thing and be boyfriends. I’m good. Really.”

“Josh don’t say that, you know I’ve done something terrible, please-“

“It’s fine.” 

Tyler sees Josh closing off to him and it rips open the blisters in his heart.

“I really am over it. The best thing for our relationship is open communication and to just move on. Is there anything else you have to say?” Josh’s voice is too steady for Tyler’s world feeling like it’s crashing around him.

He shakes his head no once and Josh turns to leave but stops. He sighs heavily and turns around to walk right up to Tyler and grab his cheeks in his hands to kiss him. Tyler sobs into it and Josh lets go and leaves the hotel room without another word.

Tyler can’t let him go like that. He rips open the door and calls down the hallway at Josh’s retreating form but Jenna swoops in and stops him from running after Josh. She pushes him gently back into the room and pulls him into a cradle as he sobs.

“What have I done? I didn’t mean to.” He clutches onto her so tightly. He can’t lose anyone else.

“You may not have intended to hurt him but you did. Just because you didn’t realize or didn’t know that you did it, doesn’t absolve you of guilt. But I know you know that.” She shushes him.

“I want to fix this but I don’t know how.” He sucks in a harsh breath. The thorns in his heart have grown into a sharp thicket.

Jenna sighs sadly. “I don’t know either sweetheart. But even if I did it would be up to you to find out for yourself anyway. You and Josh are meant for forever. You’ll get through this I promise.” 

Tyler only cries harder. He wonders if Josh is doing the same into Debby’s arms right now. 

What has he done?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is this only angsty for me? Probably. I have no idea why this fic speaks to me when I’m not even married. Maybe it’s addressing abandonment issues? Who knows.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> References of self harm and dysphoria in this chapter, please be cautious.

Things are different after that. Not weird or tense. Just different. Josh still kisses him hello or goodbye but nothing more. It feels like back when he and Josh were just best friends still teetering along the edges of something more. 

At least the horrible hay fever in his heart has seemed to go dormant under the more pressing realization of hurting Josh. The untreated open wounds from his scratching feel more like blood poisoning now, making his limbs beat like they have a heart of their own.

Tyler is still clueless on what to do. His attempts to get Josh to talk about it with him again have gone fruitless, Josh shuts him down every time. It’s always the same excuses: “there’s nothing to apologize for” or “neither of us are to blame” or “there’s nothing for you to fix I just wanted you to know” but even after Josh says that things are still different. Tyler knows he has to figure out what to do but talking to Josh is obviously the wrong way.

He can’t just do nothing though. He starts by doing what he knows best. He starts buying flowers at every city they stop in, different kinds from different places, not anything extravagant because he knows Josh doesn’t like that and he doesn’t want Josh to feel like he’s trying to buy his way back into his good graces. But they’re always yellow. That he can do. A new kind in each city waiting in Josh’s dressing room when they get there. Josh doesn’t know how he manages to do it. Tyler figures since Josh isn’t outright dumping them in the trash or telling him to stop then he must be doing something right.

He almost has a breakdown when they reach a new city and he’s been to 5 different stores on their route and there are no yellow flowers to buy. He’s so desperate that, 30 minutes away from arriving at their next arena, he makes his bus pull over to the side of the road when he sees yellow butterweed growing in the median.

He’ll have to remember to give the driver a raise.

Cars honk at him as they drive by the crazy man picking flowers at the side of the road and he can just see the headlines now: Lead singer of Twenty One Pilots loses his sanity; pictured in the middle of nowhere on a busy highway picking flowers. It’d be worth the damage control for Josh.

This means his bus arrives a little later than Josh’s at the arena and he almost trips over himself to try and beat Josh to his dressing room. He thinks he’s made it until he turns the door knob and finds it locked, Josh’s practice drumming never wavers like he heard somebody trying to break down his door and Tyler thanks the heavens for Josh’s noise canceling headphones. He takes that thanks back when he realizes Josh has probably seen there are no flowers in his room.

Tyler does the best he can to carefully wrap the stems of the butterweed in yellow tape and then use another piece to tape the cluster to Josh’s door. He feels like he should leave a note to explain himself but he doesn’t think it would do him any justice.

Josh never calls him out on it, but he does see that Josh had liked a photo on twitter of Tyler in the median that a fan had captured, with disputes over whether or not it was really him all over his feed.

Things still don’t improve though. It doesn’t help that Jenna has been practically glued to Josh’s side throughout the whole ordeal and Tyler ends up spending most of his time with Debby. It’s like they’ve swapped partners in some weird freaky friday accident. Not that there were any sides to be picked but it kind of feels that way when Jenna only comes to bed after he’s already asleep, chooses to sit next to Josh instead of him, and starts riding on Josh’s bus more often than his. He knows it’s probably just her motherly instinct, but he can’t help but start to feel a little lonely.

Jenna told him that she refused to get in the middle of the situation, and didn’t want to be the middle man between him and Josh. Tyler didn’t think that would include his alienation. Realistically though, she’s right, and Josh needs more comfort than ever so Tyler can get his shit together to figure out what he’s supposed to do.

The blood poisoning spreads to his mind, searing and angry and swollen with fluid that bubbles under his membranes surface that makes the skin there grow taught. He doesn’t know how to pop it safely to release the tension of the unknown.

He thinks he’s alone on his bus late one night somewhere between Arizona and California, sitting at the bus dining table with a single light on beaming down at what he’s working on, when Debby appears from the bunks and sits across from him. 

He jumps, not aware that there was anybody else except roadies with him.

“What are you doing here?” He blurts before he can stop himself.

She raises and amused eyebrow at his outburst and rubs her eye with a sleeve covered hand.

“You’re good with words lately.” Debby pulls out a box of cereal and milk, and sets a bowl down in front of him as well as herself.

Tyler berates himself for his poor choice in words and silently agrees with her.

His stomach grumbles at the sight of the cereal and racks his brain to remember the last time he ate. He’s bad at remembering to take care of himself when he’s wrapped up in his own head. He doesn’t think he would’ve survived writing the new record if Jenna didn’t periodically check in on him to shove a sandwich down his throat or shove his body into the shower.

“I fell asleep here because Josh’s bus was too loud. Too many people on that one.” She says quietly.

Tyler looks up to the clock on the microwave that reads 3:18 a.m. and down to where Debby was pouring him a healthy bowl of cereal and pushing the milk across the table for him.

“Whatcha workin on?” She asks with a full mouth.

Tyler pushes the papers to the side and pulls his bowl closer to take a big bite. He chews thoughtfully for a moment and takes in how peaceful his bus is at this hour with just the gentle hum of the bus going 70 on asphalt under his bare feet.

“Honestly? Um I’ve-“ Tyler clears his throat in nervousness. “I’ve been working on writing something to him.” He takes another bite to avoid having to speak more.

Her eyes flick down to the stack of pages and back up to him as she crunches slowly. A little smirk appears on her face before she speaks. 

“Mr. Wordsmith having a hard time coming up with the right words? Never thought I’d see the day.”

Tyler lets his spoon drop back into a bowl and fits his head into his hands. It’s too sensitive of a topic for him right now to stop the angry tears that spring to his eyes.

“I can’t- I can’t take the teasing right now, Deb.” He whispers and his voice wavers. “I know I deserve it but-“

Debby realizes she’s hit a sore spot and moves to sit in the bench next to him.

“You don’t deserve anything bad. Just because you messed up doesn’t mean you deserve to have it done back to you.” She says with a strong air of finality.

Debby is used to Tyler having thick skin, a tiny comment rendering him this vulnerable makes her remember how fragile he used to be before getting confident in his and Josh’s relationship. This fight has stripped him of the confidence he had so carefully built up because his confidence was nurtured and encouraged to grow because of Josh.

“Maybe I don’t deserve it but in a twisted way it makes me feel better. Because I’ll never be able to make this right. I wish he would just yell at me so we could be even, though I know it’s wrong.”

“Both of you will overcome this.” She says gently.

“That’s just it. He’s already over it! But I’m not! We’re are on two different pages and I’m struggling to find my place on the page. He’s usually the one to help me find the correct line.” Tyler says pitifully.

Debby sighs and Tyler knows she doesn’t have the right answer either. He enjoys the comfort she provides as she pats his back, and realizes how much he misses his other partners. He’s the type that always needs reassurance in both physical and emotional ways and has been starved of it the past month or so.

“I’m sorry I snapped at you in the hotel room that night. I was quick to judgment where I had no right to be. I think you understand though because we are both so fiercely protective of him, but still I should’ve thought about how the bomb dropping would’ve affected you before biting your head off.” She jokes lightly.

“S’alright. You didn’t say anything that wasn’t true.” He shrugs and goes back to his now soggy cereal to hide his emotions. 

He closes off just as quickly as he opens up and Debby realizes the conversation is over and retreats back to the bunks. Tyler ends up finishing her cereal too.

His poisoned heart pumps sour blood, thick and heavy. He feels slow and viscous. His heart has to beat twice as hard but twice as slower to move the soupy blood through his veins. 

The infection takes hold one afternoon backstage a month after Josh’s revelation.

He and Josh are sifting through gifts from fans, sitting on the floor looking through various pieces. They’re too far away from each other. It makes Tyler feel twice as bad that Josh isn’t acting any different towards him since before their fight, it makes Tyler feel like he’s losing his mind. Josh will joke around with him and talk with him like normal but to Tyler it feels all surface level. Josh won’t let Tyler kiss him for too long, never lets it go beyond a chaste peck, certainly hasn’t hugged him or even fist bumped him, yet they’re still able to have their deep conversations. It’s exactly like when they were just best friends. It’s confusing. 

Tyler knows it’s how Josh felt when Tyler played with his emotions years ago and wonders how Josh survived him, with a smile and an open heart, while Tyler was just getting a tiny spoonful of his own medicine and he was drowning. Tyler had fed Josh the whole bowl of twisted emotions and Josh had ate it up and said thank you afterwards and didn’t let him affect him. Josh is too good.

It’s quiet while they read their respective pieces. Tyler picks up his pocket knife to open up a small package taped up like Fort Knox. He miscalculates how hard he’s pressing and his hand slips and the knife catches his other arm that was holding the box steady. A long vertical gash from his wrist to the middle of his forearm.

He gasps and drops the knife and clutches at the wound.

Josh sees the blood dripping through his fingers and he looks so scared. He pulls Tyler to his feet which have gone numb. His whole body has as he looks at the all too familiar line and feels a gross shiver go down his spine at the sight.

They make it to the bathroom that’s blessedly empty and Tyler realizes that he recognizes the fear in Josh’s eyes. It used to be a familiar face that Josh would hold when they were first starting out and Josh was too good at catching him in the act of intentionally doing it.

Tyler flinches when Josh grabs his wrist and runs it under the sink. He flinches more from Josh’s touch than he does the pain and he knows Josh knows.

They’re able to see how deep it is with the blood washed away and it is a little concerning, considering it’s vertical. Josh wraps the cut in a towel and holds pressure there. They haven’t said a word to each other in an hour.

Tyler was supposed to be the one comforting Josh and here he was selfishly being taken care of again. How did he fall so far? Tyler feels the infection in his heart cloud his vision as he focuses on the barely there warmth he can feel seeping through the towel from Josh’s hand. He misses touching Josh so much he feels like his heart is actually going to give up.

“Accident.” Tyler whispers finally. Just in hopes that Josh’s worried eyes will relax. He hates knowing Josh is upset because of this on top of already hurting him before.

“I know.” Josh whispers back.

Tyler swallows harshly where a lump has formed in his throat and curses himself. He’s really going to cry because Josh is finally touching him?

“Hurts.” Tyler sniffles. He leaves it open ended enough that he hopes Josh understands he means he’s emotionally about to crack into a million pieces and not because of a stupid cut. But he doesn’t say what he really wants to because he still feels like his own pain isn’t justified in comparison to what Josh went through because of him. 

“I know.” Josh says and there’s an underlying hint of compassion in his voice and Tyler really could die happy right there that Josh has acknowledged it.

When Josh removes the towel, the bleeding has stopped. He pulls out the first aid kit from the supply closet and wraps Tyler’s wrist with such careful fingers and gentle touches that Tyler actually goes into a full blown panic attack.

Josh ties the wrap off in a tiny bow and finally meets Tyler’s eyes. Tyler looks at himself in the mirror and sees his shiny wide eyes and chest rising and falling too quickly. His vision is fuzzy around the corners and he feels too cold.

“Tyler. Breathe.” Josh says barely audible.

But Tyler can’t. Because when he looks in the mirror he doesn’t recognize himself. He doesn’t look the way he’s supposed to look. He looks the way he did when he was 23 and scared and too gaunt with dark circles and fresh lines on his wrists and that scares him. He blinks but the vision of his younger self staring back at him that doesn’t disappear in the mirror.

Josh takes his head in his hands and turns him barely to look away from himself in the mirror. He’s breathing too quick. He needs to get out of this bathroom right now. Out of the hall, out of the backstage area, out of the arena. He doesn’t know where he just needs to be away. He looks down and his wrist is bleeding again from his amped up heartbeat and he runs. He runs and Josh’s calls after him are muffled in his ears. He’s completely lost in his surroundings.

Tyler tries to remember where he is, which arena this is, what state he’s in, what day of the week it is but his mind has gone blank. He’s in sensory overload and the only thing his mind is doing is screaming at him to find a place to be safe.

He finds a closet somewhere, and tucks himself into the corner and curls into himself. The only light coming from the little sliver under the door. He takes gasping breaths and rocks himself a little. He knows he’s having a panic attack and hasn’t had one like this since before he even married Jenna. Everything is all wrong. Josh used to help him through these when he would wake up in the middle of the night stiff as a board but screaming.

It takes him a while to get himself out of his stupor. His muscles feel overworked from being tensed for so long. His teeth ache where he had clenched them, a migraine stings behind his eyes from the poison.

No one asks him where he’s been when he re-emerges. 

Josh only asks him if he’s okay and Tyler nods without meeting his eyes before they go onstage. 

His dysphoria only grows worse over the next week. He stumbles around confused most days. Every time he looks down at his wrist it gets worse. The slash goes through the three tattooed lines there and he wonders if when it heals, if the skin that will grow there will be white and soft or if it will even leave a scar at all. He wonders if it will disrupt the ink of his tattoo and he’ll have to get it redone over the scar.

He knows that it’s because of the cut that he’s so out of it, looking down at it on his wrist only sends his mind into the headspace he was in when cuts were a regular occurrence.

He can feel everyone’s worried glances at him when he mistakenly calls his bus ‘the van’ but doesn’t have it in him for excuses. Jenna is there to make one up for him.

“You must be pretty tired why don’t we go lay down for a nap?” She shuffles him to the back of the bus into the bedroom and sits him down on the edge of the bed.

He starts before she can.

“I’m hallucinating. Every time I look down at my wrist it looks too bony. Every time I look at my thigh the tattoo isn’t there. Every time I look in the mirror I feel like I’m in a different body. I’m scared, Jenna. I woke up yesterday and thought it was January. Genuinely I thought it was January. It’s freaking September. I wake up with nightmares that I haven’t had for years, and I’m surprised every time I touch my head and there’s hair on top of it. It’s like my current self is floating somewhere around my subconscious and my past self has taken my body and mind hostage. I don’t recognize myself.” He trembles as he says it, looking down at his hands that’s shake and all he wants to do is paint them black to feel secure.

He imagines that’s what the blood poisoning in his heart looks like. Black and pigmented and hard to scrub away, staining his veins and everything that his blood touches until all his organs turn black with rot and eventually eat away at the outside of him.

Jenna sits down next to him and urges him to lay down with his head in her lap. The ceiling of the bus has a mirror, probably a renovation from an old drug addicted rockstar that owned it before him, wanting to be able to watch himself screw his groupies. Tyler looks right back at himself but his form doesn’t register in his brain, he just looks like a swirling mess of blocks, pieces of himself moving around trying to fit back into their correct places.

Jenna’s face leans over him and blocks his view, golden hair coming down to flutter over his cheeks. He squeezes her leg in a panicky way, terrified she’ll move and he’ll be able to see the mirror again.

“Do you think this is your minds way of... coping? Coping with everything that’s happened. By punishing itself and throwing you back into that same headspace that was familiar and comfortable at one time?” She rubs his cheek and he’s reminded of the fact that he has stubble now and it makes him dizzy again.

“Back to the way you were when you messed up?” She keeps it vague for his sake and he’s thankful.

He shrugs and tries to calm his churning stomach. Everything he takes into his body, air, food, water, all turns black as soon as it passes through his throat.

“I need help.” He says brokenly and he gasps in pain when his heart stabs in hurt.

Jenna nods and holds him. He cries and cries and keeps mumbling apologies over and over again to her. She’s patient and loving and kind and it combats the war in his mind.

Tyler doesn’t deserve any of his partners.


	4. Chapter 4

Tyler gets help. He gets his old therapist on skype twice a week and ups his meds and his body and mind even out. The infection in his heart gets treated with words as he talks it out with his therapist. It still feels like he’s taking antibiotics for the wrong type of infection, no matter if they help him or not. It’ll work temporarily.

The cut on his arm heals into a white line that disrupts the ink of his wrist tattoo and he schedules to get it touched up after tour is over. His therapist reminds him that when he would intentionally make lines on his wrist, they were horizontal in comparison to the fresh accidental vertical one and it helps calm Tyler’s dysphoria.

Josh starts coming around more after that and it only makes Tyler more guilty. He knows Josh is just worried for him but Tyler still doesn’t feel worth it. Worth the fuss and the effort and the coddling.

Tyler starts writing poems in the flowers he gives to Josh, they’re pulled straight from old journals and vows of his own that he doesn’t realize we’re really vows when he was writing them all those years ago, cowardly calling them just songs instead. 

But it seems the more he does to apologize, the more Josh pushes back. He finds the notes carefully folded up and snuck into his pockets or his luggage without a trace of Josh even though he knows it’s his doing.

Tyler is so desperate for Josh to acknowledge the words he nearly risks a scandal one night at a show. He’s got heart burn in his actual heart. He feels like it would hurt less if one of the vials hanging above their heads fell and pierced him in the heart instead of this aching longing he wants Josh to understand.

They’re at b-stage. It’s barely 8 feet wide and Tyler stares directly at Josh while he sings Smithereens. Josh doesn’t have to play for the first two verses, and Tyler knows he’s avoiding his gaze as Josh’s glazed eyes run over the crowd instead of at him.

Tyler hopes that if he stares for long enough Josh will crack and look at him but he never does. Josh wipes his sweaty hands on his pants and grabs his sticks to join in for the final chorus.

He can’t take it anymore and stands up from his piano as he continues singing and walks straight up to Josh’s kit to stand on the kick drum and point at Josh just like he used to do when they performed Forest, while he professes his promises through the words of the song.

Josh flips his hat around from the back to the front in between beats so his face is effectively blocked from Tyler’s perch on his drums. Won’t even look at Tyler’s shoes in front of him and instead bounces and shakes his head from side to side with the beat.

Tyler steps down, defeated and returns to his piano before the arena goes dark.

Neither of them talk to each other as they go their separate ways to their buses after the show. 

“Things won’t be different, my ass.” Tyler grumbles as he locks himself away in the back bedroom of the bus alone.

He knows it’s the last thing he should do but apparently his impulsivity is going unchecked tonight as he constantly refreshes his twitter feed to see what people are saying about his stunt.

The videos singe and burn is chest as he watches Josh ignore him in front of thousands of people. Their snide words and wild theories and accusations do nothing to assuage his guilt.

It feels like there is a flaming bow scratching angrily at his heart strings, pulling and plucking until they’re brittle and weak.

He throws his phone in frustration when he sees theories about the band breaking up and winces when the phone smacks the wall harder than intended and he knows he’s going to have to get the screen repaired. 

He sighs heavily and rolls over to yell into his pillow. Why can he never do anything right?

Something feels uncomfortable under his stomach and it’s not the guilt settling in his gut like usual. He reaches into the front pocket of his hoodie and yanks out- of course the note he left with Josh’s flowers before the show. How Josh manages to do it he will never understand.

He opens it angrily, ready to rip his stupid words to pieces when he catches Josh has edited his poem with a thick black marker.

Josh has blacked out most of the words and left four words unscathed.

You. Are. My. Home.

Tyler lets the paper flutter out of his hands to the floor of the bus and holds a pillow over his head as he cries into it. He wonders if Josh still feels that way after his bold move tonight. Probably not.

Neither of them really even look each other in the eye for the next few days, dancing around each other. The crew is finally starting to notice and if Tyler sees one more tweet about their lack of chemistry onstage he will actually quit the band. Because of this fight it’s letting the live show down and he feels even worse for disappointing fans. 

His heart burn never lets up and the flames that erupt from each harsh beat of his heart, licks up his veins and melts them into gooey magma, and when they cool they’re black and hard as a rock, unable to let anything flow through them.

They’ve got a press day lined up while they’re in Europe, they like to get it all done in one day so they don’t have to spread it out over their touring time. 6 interviews and one press conference later Tyler thinks this may be the worst day of his career. Too many prying questions and too many short answers from Josh and too many uncomfortable laughs as they brush off inquiries about their future as a band. Tyler isn’t even sure they have a future as partners at this point let alone as a band.

That scares him. 

The thought that he may be losing Josh.

It’s one of the last interviews of the day that really nails it on the head.

They’re sitting on a couch too far apart. Where normally they’d be sitting thigh by thigh, Josh’s arm resting on the couch above him, today they’re practically on opposite ends. Josh has his legs crossed and his chin in his hand, elbow propped up on the arm rest. His foot shakes and Tyler knows he’s either nervous or annoyed or maybe both. Tyler sits as close to Josh as he dares, with Josh already positioning his body to face away from him.

She’s a good interviewer however. Good-natured and not invasive, albeit a little shallow and they can both tell she doesn’t really know who they are. But that makes things easier, lets them both let out a sigh of relief that she won’t be asking specific questions that they don’t have the answer to. Or so Tyler thinks.

“How did you get to be so good with words? Did you study?” She asks in a thick Polish accent. They both understand her clearly though and she’s completely unaware of the sharp tension that settles between them.

Tyler clears his throat and shuffles in his seat as he tries to choose his words very carefully here.

“People always think I’m so good with words because I write this music but I wanna be very clear that I’m terrible at talking. I get really wrapped up in my own head and I can talk about that deeper side of me pretty easily but when it comes to having conversations with or about others I don’t have a lot of social skill or understanding. That can cause some issues because obviously communication is very important.” He laughs awkwardly and doesn’t dare look at Josh.

“Does that mean you fight?” She smiles at him still blissfully unaware of the bomb dropping question she’s asking.

“No, never.” Tyler answers instinctually.

He sees Josh go stiff beside him and he realizes he’s basically just denied that they’re in the middle of a rift and effectively ignoring the problem, and the interviewer is already moving onto another question but he has to stop her to correct himself and fix this while he still has a minuscule chance.

“Actually, yeah.” He cuts her off. Josh’s foot stills.

“Yeah?” The interviewer looks excited at the prospect of juicy news. Tyler continues before he loses his nerve.

“Yeah it’s never really a true fight. It’s usually more of ‘ok we have a problem let’s sit down and talk it out’.” He starts. The interviewer nods like she understands even though Tyler knows it’s impossible that she could, due to the language barrier and her lack of knowledge about them.

“You know we always like to brag that we’ve always been on the same page, but there are times where one of us will skip ahead in the chapter and there’s that moment of suspension where we have to either wait for one to catch up or the other to go back to find them. But that means the person who’s skipped ahead has to go back and reread what they missed while the other person has already read that part and then there’s this period of time where your going back and forth trying to match up your reading schedules again to be on the same line. That happens sometimes for us. There are times when it takes me a lot longer to catch up and I have to go back and re-read the page because I’ve skimmed it and not taken anything in because I’m reading too fast.” Tyler admits and rubs his wedding ring anxiously. He can see Josh has tilted his head towards him just barely.

The interviewer nods for him to continue.

“The page being representative of our... friendship.” Tyler swallows out instead of saying relationship. “The words being representative of our lives together.” His heart is racing a million miles a minute. The magma from his veins leaks into his mind and he can feel it searing along the ridges of his brain and rendering it blackened.

“Is it hard to get back on the same page when one of you skips ahead?” She questions kindly.

“Depends on how far ahead I’ve skipped.” Tyler let’s out a breathless laugh.

“And what happens when one of you loses your place on the page?” She raises her eyebrows and looks between the both of them. Maybe she understands more than she lets on.

“The other goes back and meets them in the middle.” Josh answers for him.

Tyler whips up to look at him but Josh is still staring at his hands, picking at the chipped white paint on his nails absentmindedly.

“Does it happen often?” She sits forward in her seat and tugs down the hem of her skirt.

“No but when it does it’s usually a big jump. You can be on the same page as somebody for a while and not realize that they are reading just a tiny bit faster than you, and then suddenly you’re still on the first paragraph while they’re on the last line and everything gets mixed up. I’m guilty of doing that often. I get lost in whatever I’m reading usually, the rest of the world disappears around me, which, isn’t good because then I lose sight of how far my friend-“ Tyler cuts off and nods to Josh. “-is on the page.”

She nods and Tyler sees Josh uncross his legs and turn towards him on the couch a little. No one is stopping him so he carries on speaking.

“Reading together is meant to be going line by line word for word together, and letting yourself tunnel vision into focusing on just the words and not what they’re really saying is a bad habit of mine. It’s not intentional, but I have the habit of just seeing the words for what they are- just a bunch of letters pushed up together to make a sound and a thought, instead of taking them for what they mean, what their definition is. Worst part is I never realize that I’m doing it.”

“So how do you keep yourself in check?” She questions.

“He does.” Tyler points to Josh. “Without him I’d be lost a chapter behind. Maybe I would even be reading the wrong book without his help. Even he sometimes has a hard time figuring out where I am on the page too. But that’s not his fault, I’m easy at getting lost between the words, in between the blank spaces and scribbling my own book in the margins and spaces instead of focusing on the real novel at hand. He’s very good at bringing me out of that and putting me back on the right line, but even then he’s always encouraging my work in between the lines.” Tyler scratches at the tattoo on his thigh of Josh’s name, and it soothes the scratching in his heart.

“This is all very metaphorical and I think you’ve lost me.” The interviewer laughs and they both return a halfhearted one.

“It’s alright he knows what I mean.” Tyler finally chances a look at Josh who’s staring back at him.

Josh does.

His brain has been almost entirely engulfed in the hot, fiery, poisonous thoughts and he knows it’s only a matter of time before the lava cools and his entire mind is nothing but a desolate black barren wasteland where once flora and fauna grew and thrived and powered the delicate ecosystem of his whole body.

She thanks them for their time and stands to leave.

The flow of the fire is snuffed out and his mind is doused in the relief of ice cold water being poured over his burns when Josh pulls him into a hug as soon as the interviewer leaves and the door is closed. 

Tyler shivers at the sudden contrast of temperatures in his mind and stays stock still in surprise at Josh touching him. He’s actually hugging him.

He prays to God that the next interviewer is stuck in traffic so they can’t come through the door and break up this monumental moment in Tyler’s mind.

“Tyler. I know.” Josh says muffled into his shirt. 

Tyler hesitantly picks his arms up from where they were frozen at his side and moves slowly so Josh can see what he’s doing and pull away if he wants to.

He doesn’t though. Tyler gets his arms wrapped entirely around Josh’s middle and presses in just barely. He whimpers and snuffles into Josh’s hoodie covered shoulder. He hasn’t been hugged in 3 months. If Josh pulls away now he will actually die. 

“Please.” Tyler begs, his need for comfort overriding his shame of begging Josh for it when Josh is the one who should be getting it from him.

Tyler gasps and digs his fingers into Josh’s warm hoodie as he pulls him further into the embrace. 

“Closer, closer.” Tyler begs and tugs and gets Josh’s shoulder wet from the tears he didn’t even know were falling.

Josh properly hauls him close and tucks his face in and Tyler heaves a breath and holds it in his lungs until they burn and threaten to burst. He loses himself in the feeling of Josh’s warm cheek against his neck and his hands splayed over Tyler’s shaking back, strong arms holding him together.

“I’m sorry.” Tyler whispers.

“I forgive you.” Josh replies and squeezes him tighter.

“You shouldn’t.” Tyler knows as soon as the words leave his mouth that they’re wrong and manipulative. “I mean,  
no, I don’t-“ He fumbles trying to correct himself.

“I know. But I do.” Josh says and Tyler goes boneless in the hug and lets out a shuddery cry.

The cold rush of water trickles down from his head and flows down his bones and soothes the angry hurtful fire in his heart until it’s flowing with rushing water and replenishing the burnt nerves. He can breathe. 

They skip the last interview and Josh is the one that leads them around the building, avoiding the right people so they can get one more minute alone before their management finds them and berates them for skipping.

They make it into one bus together where Jenna and Debby are sitting at the dining table waiting for one of them to come back. Tyler isn’t sure who’s bus this is but if Jenna and Debby were both on it, it was probably Josh’s.

They say nothing as both boys enter together but wordlessly make room for them to all sit together at the table.

Tyler is mostly out of it, practically drunk on the warmth emanating from Josh’s knee where it’s pressed against his own under the table. 

An understanding passes between the four of them that Josh and Tyler have stopped falling down the hill and have finally brushed themselves off to truck back up the mountain together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end :) This was originally where I was going to end this fic, but I have an extra long epilogue chapter that I think adds well to the story, but it’s not necessary for you to read if you don’t want to. It’s a happy/fluffy one of course.
> 
> If this is where you’re stopping, leave a kudos or a comment if you enjoyed if you’d like!


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is the original reason for me using Polarize lyrics as the title. Chapter warning for slight religious angst.

They’re in Switzerland for a day in between shows, two weeks after the press day, walking around the city together when they reach a safe place to camp on the metaphorical mountain they are climbing together.

It’s the height of winter there which allows them to cover up more to make sure they don’t get recognized. Just the two of them, bundled up and exploring aimlessly around the tiny town for lack of anything else to do.

Josh slips his hand out of his own glove and grabs Tyler’s to remove his so they can intertwine their fingers and swing their hands despite the biting weather. Tyler feels like he could run up the mountain side and sing that the hills are alive with the sound of music when is heart soars at the intimate action. He’s never taking anything Josh does for granted ever again.

Tyler is so wrapped up in Josh’s hand in his that he nearly falls when Josh stops so suddenly to practically smush his nose up against the glass of one of the passing shops.

Tyler turns and he feels himself pale and go rigid with nervousness when he sees it’s a jewelry shop.

“Can we go in?” Josh asks with a hint of awe in his voice and really Tyler doesn’t think he could get his voice to work if he tried so he just tugs on Josh’s hand gently to lead them both in.

It’s overly warm inside the shop due to the multitudes of spotlights shining down on the various gems to make them sparkle and entice people into purchasing them, but Tyler and Josh both keep their hats and scarves on. It’s too risky not to.

Josh goes straight to the ring case and Tyler shuffles more conservatively behind him, mostly scared out of his wits at what Josh is insinuating what he wants to do.

He rolls his eyes when he catches Tyler’s nervous shuffling and motions for him to stand beside him to peer into the case together. 

“I- Josh do you want- are we just looking or-“ Tyler feels stupid but he needs to understand what’s happening before he doesn’t get the hint and messes up again.

Josh smiles fondly.

“If you see something you like, let me know.” He says teasingly.

Tyler looks down dumbly at the case of rings and then to Josh’s hand where it rested on the counter and gets immediately overwhelmed at the thought of seeing another ring on his finger.

Tyler looks down at his own ring finger and thinks it would probably be uncomfortable and too suspicious to wear a second one on that finger. He’s been wearing tape around his pointer for Josh for nearly two years now.

“Yeah that’s where I was thinking too.” Josh says, ever observant at Tyler’s whirring mind, and rubbing his own left pointer finger.

The shop keeper comes over to look at them curiously, down at both of their hands that already have a wedding band on and back up to their faces but doesn’t comment.

“Could I see that one please?” Josh points to a pretty onyx band with tiny rectangle diamonds inlaid all the way around it.

Josh and Debby had both gone for gold rings while Tyler had his own black ring and Jenna had a silver one. Tyler knew Josh had always admired the black ring but his family had influenced his decision to get a traditional gold one.

He swallows dryly and loosens his scarf uselessly so he can breathe easier when he feels lightheaded watching Josh try the ring onto his left pointer finger.

“Hm. Nope. What about you, see anything that catches your eye?” Josh hands the ring back to the keeper and Tyler’s eyes flit down to the case and land of the first one that grabs his attention. It’s silver and thicker than his other wedding band.

“Um, that one.” He says quietly, still reeling that this is actually happening.

It ends up being too small for his finger and only fits down to his knuckle where he puts the tape usually and actually feels like he’s going to faint.

“Just a minute.” Josh holds up his finger to the owner and herds Tyler away from prying ears to check on him.

“We don’t have to do this. I know it’s spur of the moment, if it’s too much we can-“

“No!” Tyler exclaims. “No I’m just overwhelmed, I didn’t prepare myself to be doing this today and it’s taking me a second to catch up that this is really happening.” Tyler admits and shoves his hands into the front of Josh’s hoodie pocket to warm his hands.

He’s unable to stop the giddy bubble of laughter that erupts out of his throat and slaps a hand over his mouth.

This time Tyler is the one to drag Josh over to the case with newfound excitement and bubbling enthusiasm.

“I think that one would look good on you, J.” He says softly and points to another onyx ring that glitters with sliver filled into purposefully patterns in the ring.

Josh nods for the keeper to pull it out and Josh slips it onto his pointer finger easily. His hand is shaking a bit and Tyler thinks maybe Josh isn’t as composed about this as he gives off.

It’s shiny and Tyler is able to get a closer look at the silver swirling designs in the black metal. Josh turns his hand over to appreciate it and looks to Tyler for his approval.

“Don’t get it just because I pointed it out!” Tyler splutters but he has to pat himself on the back for the choice because it does look really good on Josh.

“No, I’m not, I really like it. It’s perfect.” Josh doesn’t want to hand it over to the keeper because he’s already infatuated with it, but he unfortunately has to so he can pay.

They wait patiently for Tyler to pick out a ring he likes and he does end up going for a silver one, a little thinner than his black one but just as beautiful with a intricately engraved pattern in the metal, sparkling as he turns it in the beaming lights of the shop.

Tyler thinks it’s immensely appropriate that he has matching rings for both of his partners now, a black one with Jenna but matching Josh’s and a silver one matching Jenna’s but for Josh. 

They’re both in a stupor as they pay blindly, surprising the store owner that they’re both paying in full.

He has a good sense of humor though and wraps them in separate boxes, crossing his wrists when he holds them out to hand the opposite rings to them when they’re done. He realizes they’re for each other so he gives them each other’s boxes and gives a little smile and a wave as they practically stumble out of the store, pulling on their coats and laughing breathlessly.

“We should stay in Europe for a while. After the tour is over.” Josh pulls up his scarf around his face to hide his pink cheeks.

The insinuation is clearly there that he wants to get married over here. 

“Yeah that’d be nice. Just to have some downtime before going home.” Tyler says nonchalantly like they both don’t know what’s happening.

They decide on London. It’s historically an important place for them and it’s the last city they will be in before the tour is over.

Jenna and Debby were ecstatic at the prospect of a wedding as Tyler and Josh both showed them the rings in secret, even though they had been with each other to pick them out.

Blessedly, they were able to get a wedding planner on skype to give them a thorough list of everything they needed to pick out and decide on so they could get a head start on the planning. They barely had a month before they would be in London.

All they had to do was send back their choices and she would take care of putting in the orders. It made everything much less stressful.

Although wedding planning with Josh could never be stressful. It only serves to choke the remaining dormant poison ivy in his heart with his love.

They pick up their suits in Austria and have a personal cake tasting in Italy, they plan their honeymoon while on a picnic in France, and write their vows in the Netherlands. Jenna and Debby are there every step of the way of course, with encouragements and support, but don’t get in the middle of the starry eyed boys excitedly picking outlandish choices for their day, just because they can, and because they want to, and because it makes them happy.

They are able to pick whatever they want without the eyes of their families on them. Josh picks red velvet for their cake and blue hydrangeas for his boutonnière. Tyler picks out a bolo tie with his suit and slightly obnoxious floral cake decor that looks strikingly similar to the floral wallpaper in the hotel room that they had fought in. Turning a bad memory into a good one. And he applies for the marriage license.

It does strike a sour chord when, they get the license in their hands somewhere in Germany and Tyler’s first instinct is to call his family. He stuffs it down and listens to Josh call his friends in Los Angeles instead and lets himself pretend it’s him calling his family.

Neither of their siblings can come and that’s okay. It’s to be expected.

All of those thoughts melt away when he gets to stare at Josh across the crowd on dangerous platforms at night and Josh stares right back with a smile and a wild drum beat.

Things get a lot more real when they actually arrive in London the last week of tour. It gets quiet. They’re completely ready for it. Not having to worry about a color scheme or a reception or a playlist or if they groomsmen will behave because there aren’t any to worry about. It feels right. A small wedding. Its everything either of them ever wanted besides the acceptance of their family.

They get into the city late that night and are too excited to wait until the next day to see the venue. It’s a church. Despite both of their qualms with the big man upstairs their faith is still important to them. It’s a nondenominational church with signs outside that say “God welcomes all!” and “All of God’s children made equal in his likeness” and “God loves all his creations-no abominations!” which normally would’ve made both of them snort but somehow it feels comforting as they enter the church at almost midnight, just as visitors not as prospective weds.

It’s empty, void of anyone else but them. And it’s beautiful. With high ceilings painted with elaborate depictions of various scenes from the bible, stained glass windows and what looks like thousands of candles lighting up the apex. It’s pleasantly small and warm and almost cozy. Tyler thinks this is the most at home he’s ever felt in a place of worship.

He is immediately drawn to the organ piano sitting at the side of the alter while Josh runs his hands over the wooden pews and takes a seat in one to just sit back and observe the place, maybe send out a little prayer in thanks.

Tyler lets his hands run over the keys and thinks back to when he was creating Polarize, and how he used synthesized organ and how it would sound on a real organ like this. He can’t help but play the last few notes of the song slowly, eyes closing as he loses himself in how perfect it sounds reverberating throughout the church.

“Wanted to be a better brother, better son.” He whispers. It’s drowned out by the loud organ. He’s thankful.

He continues playing and looks up to the statue of christ.

“Deny. Deny. Denial.” He whispers and lowers his gaze to his hands.

He may not have his family on his side but he’s getting married before the heavens and that means more to him than their opinions of his “lifestyle” ever could.

He stops and looks over to where Josh was sitting but he’s not there anymore. Panicking, he stands up and rushes over to where he last was and sighs when he just sees Josh has laid down in the center aisle and is staring up at the painted ceiling, fingers interlaced on his stomach comfortably.

Tyler lays down beside him and mimics his position. 

“This is probably disrespectful.” Tyler whispers. Josh chokes on a laugh.

It’s perfect.

They get to have their bachelor party together, with 10,000 other people the night before their wedding. Both of them agree it was the best bachelor party they could ask for. They don’t need the support of their families when they have it from millions of people all over the world, no matter if nobody really knows. 

Trees is different that night. Tyler can hardly contain himself as he gives the speech, it being almost painful that he can’t shout to the world that he’s marrying his best friend tomorrow. Instead he politely thanks the city and bites his tongue as he pulls on the tape around his pointer finger distractedly.

They have to be forcibly pulled away from each other as they go into their respective hotel rooms with their wives that night.

“Absolutely not you can’t stay together, you aren’t allowed to see each other until noon tomorrow!” Jenna tries waving a hand in front of Josh’s face to distract him from staring at her husband.

“You will have plenty of time to suck each other’s face off on the alter, back off bucko!” Debby steps in front of Tyler so he can’t see Josh.

They go willingly after that but neither of them can hardly sleep due to the adrenaline from the show and the pre wedding jitters. It means the world to them to have their wives by their sides the night before, both of them effortlessly fitting in to their relationship with each other.

The morning of the wedding, Debby helps Josh put on his suit and chats animatedly about the decoration to keep his mind off of his nerves. He has the best partners he could ever ask for. Debby brushes his shoulders of any spec of dusts with a tear in her eye of how proud of her husband she is.

An estimated hour before they’re supposed to tie the knot, Tyler has a minor freakout. Jenna tries her best but is unable to calm him down and eventually goes to get Josh.

“Don’t you know we aren’t supposed to see each other until we meet at the alter?” Josh jokes as he pushes into the chapel where Tyler was sitting alone having his crisis.

“Josh! I just remembered and I had to tell you before we got married.” 

Josh comes to sit next to Tyler in the pew. “Do you have like weird fetish or something I need to know about before I say I do?” Josh’s smile drops when Tyler doesn’t laugh.

“We never really asked each other to marry. Well, not properly.” Tyler shrugs a little pitifully.

Josh gives a breathless laugh and pulls Tyler into a hug. There’s a still moment and then both of them are jumping out of their seat to kneel before each other.

“No I want to ask you first!”  
“I want to ask you first!”

They say at the same time.

“Marry me!”  
“Marry me!” 

They nearly yell in unison.

“Yes!”  
“Of course!” They laugh through their words that drown out each other.

“I know we aren’t supposed to kiss for another hour but-“ 

Josh cuts Tyler off as he presses their lips together in a chaste but warm kiss and Tyler sighs into it.

Neither of them walk down the aisle. Instead they both enter from opposite sides of the alter and meet each other in the middle.

Jenna, Debby, Mark and Brad, are their two witnesses each, the only other people in the church are the officiant and the musicians. It’s private and good.

They each have a novel of vows to read to each other, years of being together and only a few minutes to put their love into words isn’t really enough.

Tyler nearly drops the ring from his shaking as his sweaty hands go to slip it onto Josh’s finger.

Josh fits Tyler’s ring onto his finger and with their “I do’s” and cheers from all of the people in the room they seal their promises to each other with a kiss and are officially married.

Jenna and Debby drive them directly to the airport where they will spend two weeks in Iceland in a tiny town in a cozy cabin, just the two of them. 

It feels odd to step off of a plane hours later in a different season and be back in time, despite their years of traveling they’ll never get used to it.

Josh throws his bags down as soon as they’re inside the door and picks Tyler up bridal style, kicking the door shut and carrying him over the foyer and straight into the bathroom to share a shower to wash off the past 24 hours off of them.

Tyler can’t stop giggling the entire time at how happy he is when he catches Josh’s ring flashing in the light as they shower and let cheeky hands grab and poke at each other.

They don’t even bother to get dressed and stumble into the bedroom to make love for the first time in four months.

It’s slow and vanilla and they practically take hours just taking each other apart and putting each other back together.

Josh says it’s the best sex they’ve ever had and Tyler is kind of inclined to agree since it’s the only time love making has ever brought tears to his eyes.

They lay in bed for a long while just tracing and mapping and memorizing each other, greedy in trying to remember each other. Letting hands raise goosebumps wherever they touch and staring unabashed into each other’s eyes and at each other’s bodies, taking everything in. They’ll never let each other go again.

They don’t go soft the next few days, too wrapped up in making up for lost time for those months.

It’s in one of the in between moments that Tyler really feels like he’s actually achieved peace. That if their career died now he’d still be a completely fulfilled and happy man.

They’re sitting under an apple tree out front of their quaint and private cabin, in the middle of the lush rolling hills of Iceland, miles away from their neighbors, watching the wild horses run from the pass and through the rushing waterfall ahead of them.

“What would be our stories, if we pretended we met here? What would our lives be?” Josh asks, taking a bite of a crisp apple and leaning against the trunk of the tree.

Tyler, in a humorous mood, plays along.

“Hm. You would be the hot farm hand that catches my eye while I’m passing through the town one day. Maybe you’re selling apples for the farm you work for and I happen to be a very wary and hungry traveler that you offer an apple and a room for the night to, just because you find me cute.” Tyler laughs and lets his head rest against the bark of the tree and closes his eyes.

“Mmm yeah that sounds about right. You’d be from the states, unable to speak a lick of Icelandic and entirely dependent on the hot farm hand—me— to navigate around. Maybe your car broke down and you have to stay with me until we can get it fixed up. And you fall in love with the small town lifestyle.” Josh titters.

“And with you.” Tyler tacks on and rolls his head to look at Josh.

“You know nothing about Icelandic tradition so you woo me with yellow flowers you picked on the side of the road.” Josh smiles knowingly.

“And because I’m a city slicker moron, I end up cutting myself on a tool and you take care of me, we share a moment while you wrap up my arm.” Tyler snorts.

They’re not really making up a story anymore.

“What would our names be? Something Icelandic.” Josh ponders.

“Mm. You would be... Jog. And I would be Togg. With two G’s.”

“Why do you get two G’s?” Josh jokes in mock protest.

“Because I’m the lead singer.” Tyler says like it should be obvious and Josh kisses him to shut him up.

“We should go on a vacation. The four of us.” Josh clarifies.

“Have we ever done that just for a vacation? And not just a day off somewhere when they’re with us?” Tyler frowns and feels a little guilty.

“No. But nows the perfect time. In between breaks with touring. They’ve been so good to us they deserve it too.” Josh sighs.

He’s right. They do all need a good vacation.

They decide to come back a day early just so they can surprise their wives.

Debby had been staying with Jenna at their house in Ohio to combat the loneliness while they were gone. The boys are able to sneak into the house, getting there around three in the morning. They set down their bags and gifts for their partners and pad up the stairs quietly to the bedroom where Jenna and Debby slept in the bed.

They both crawl unceremoniously into the middle between the two of them and are able to rearrange themselves so they’re both next to each other but cuddling their own wives.

They take a moment to indulge in the peace of the quiet home and the soft breathing coming from the sleeping body’s beside them. It’s so peaceful. And right. 

The last of the poison ivy is choked and drowned in Tyler’s mind.

They were meant to last forever. Tyler considers himself pretty lucky.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There it is. Whether people identified with this fic or not it ended up being mostly for me. Been thinking about this for a long time, I’m so glad it’s finally out there.


End file.
